244 LAND AND LABOR. 



carpenter, or shoemaker, he was paid in the products 

 of the farm. His minister and his doctor were also 

 paid in the same way. These operations pervaded, as 

 a rule, throughout the whole country. The only use 

 that the farmer had for money was to pay his taxes, 

 and other demands of government. In this manner 

 was the great mass of the business of the country 

 done, causing the least possible amount of trade, and 

 in no sense dependent upon trade, as we now under- 

 stand it, for its success. 



In the larger towns and cities it was but little dif- 

 ferent, for the methods of barter and exchange, uni- 

 versal in the rural districts, were largely used in the 

 greatest centers of population. But whatever trade 

 there was, whatever use and demand existed for 

 money, was confined almost wholly to the cities. 

 There were the centers of governmental operations, 

 but by no means were they the centers of production, 

 manufacture, and consumption. Those operations 

 were distributed throughout the country, among the 

 masses of the rural districts, and were carried on al- 

 most wholly independent of trade and money. It was 

 there that the great body of the population of the 

 country was then fixed ; and it was there that much 

 the greater part of the industries of the country were 

 exercised. At that time the cities, in weight of pop- 

 ulation and amount of productive manufacture, were 

 quite insignificant as compared with that in the agri- 

 cultural and rural districts. 



But now, under the changed conditions of produc- 

 tion and manufacture, trade and commerce of every 

 nature are, in the fullest sense, altogether dependent 



